A typical modular conveyor belt is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,870,141 issued to J. M. Lapeyre on Mar. 11, 1975. According to this patent a large number of modules formed by injection molding are pivotally connected to one another to form a conveyor belt of a desired length. The link ends of one module are intermeshed and pivotally connected by means of a pivot rod to the link ends of another module until an entire belt having a desired length and width is formed. U.S. Pat. No. 4,213,527 issued June 22, 1980 to J. M. Lapeyre, et al, discloses an extruded module for forming a link conveyor belt.
Still other modular conveyor belt patents by Lapeyre and others are owned by the same assignee as the present invention which might be considered relevant to the present invention include: U.S. Pat. No. 4,832,183 entitled "Conveyor Belt Having Insertable and Selectable Conveying Member" issued May 23, 1989: U.S. Pat. No. 4,832,187 entitled "Modular Center Drive Conveyor Belt" issued May 23, 1989; and U.S. Pat. No. 4,688,670 entitled "Flat Top Conveyor Belt" issued Aug. 25, 1987.
The above referenced patents represent a typical selection of different modules used to construct conveyor belts. In almost every one of the different modular structures, belts of varying widths are fabricated by sawing at least one module of every other row to a selected width. Unfortunately, such sawing often results in the loss of an unacceptable amount of plastic material due to the saw kerf. At the very least, the saw blade leaves a rough and unacceptable surface on the cut area.
Thus, a review of the prior art reveals that to date there has not been a simple and inexpensive technique to cut modules which technique was particularly designed for the purposes of providing a smooth cut surface and without loss of material.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide apparatus and methods for accurately and quickly cutting modules to selected width(s).
It is another object of the present invention to provide such apparatus and methods for making such cuts with minimal or no loss of plastic material.
It is yet another object to provide apparatus and methods which allows the multiplicity of modules to be cut with substantially little or no labor requirements.